Citadel, SC to VMI/Lexington, Va. Special Movement

[NW Mailing List]

Mr. Smoot:

Regarding your football special movement reference which I have cut &
pasted below: for what years might you recall these special movements
occurring to and from Lexington, Va.? The earliest and latest which you
might know about would be appreciated.

Thank you.

Bob Cohen


During the early 1960's I saw the Tennessean and Birmingham Special many
times at Kemper St. Station in Lynchburg. Each carried one stainless steel
Pullman. Once every other fall, the Sewanee University football team would
come to play Hampden-Sydney and an additional Pullman (may have been
heavy-weight) was added from Chattanooga to Monroe for the team. I believe
they returned on the evening Birmingham Special.

The Pelican came through Lynchburg both ways in the middle of the night. It
carried two Pullman cars both ways. The only time I saw it the Pullmans
were Southern stainless steel.

As an aside, there was another every other year football related special
movement through Lynchburg. A 15 or so car extra was run from Charleston,
SC to Lexington to bring the entire Citadel student body to VMI for the
football game. This involved Southern, N&W, and C&O. The train came into
Lynchburg on the Southern, went down the old main line to Union Station,
briefly backed onto the N&W to connect with the C&O, went up the C&O to
Balcony Falls, then up the N&W valley line to Buena Vista, then up the C&O
branch to Lexington. Southern motive power was used for the entire trip.
Coming back in the evening, it came through Union Station just after the
Powhatan Arrow went east. I regret to report that there was evidence of
drinking on the train as it returned!

    Raymond Smoot
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://six.pairlist.net/pipermail/nw-mailing-list/attachments/20130712/179cb4fc/attachment.htm>